


Into Thin Air

by BrigidsBlest



Series: Into Thin Air [1]
Category: The X-Files
Genre: F/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-02-11
Updated: 2018-02-11
Packaged: 2019-03-16 20:51:19
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 3
Words: 9,139
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/13644201
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/BrigidsBlest/pseuds/BrigidsBlest
Summary: While Scully is away, Mulder is called out to investigate a new case. Too bad there's hidden agendas behind the one who alerted him to it...(Reading order for the three stories in this series is:1) Into Thin Air2) Brainstorm3) Ravana's Children )





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> This is the first fic I ever posted online (at the Gossamer site, originally, and it's still there); not the first fic I ever wrote, mind you (there's plenty of stuff from the Dark Ages in my filing cabinets) but still... This is over 20 years old. Be kind.

**March 10, 1994; Washington, D.C.**

 

                "Here, Spooky.  This one's right up your alley."

                Fox Mulder looked up with a frown.  He had never liked Agent Arnold Stone, and counted himself lucky that circumstances had never thrown them together on an assignment before. Rumors around the office had it that Stone was crooked.  _But if those rumors were true_ , Mulder considered, _Stone would no doubt be on suspension pending an investigation_.  He grimaced at the thought of going out alone on what was probably--knowing Stone as he did--a wild goose chase.  With Scully taking time off from the office after the deaths of her father and Jack Willis, he was catching up on some long-neglected paperwork. Mulder regarded the videocassette that Stone had tossed down on his desk with distaste.

                "What is it?" he asked at last.

                "The comptroller's office at the 32nd Street Naval Base in San Diego was robbed Thursday night.  Someone took some of the payroll cash right out of the safe.  No forced entry, no fingerprints; the safe wasn't blown open.  Security cameras caught it all; looks like the intruder didn't care who saw her."

                "Her?" Mulder murmured, picking up the cassette and sliding it from its case.  Stone nodded, a gleam in his eyes.

                "Yeah, some girl," he growled.  "Have fun, Spooky; I've got _real_ work to do."  He marched out of the office, and Mulder turned to his TV, turning it on and sliding the cassette into the VCR.

                The picture flickered on instantly, showing the well-lit hallway outside the comptroller's office, then switching after five seconds to the view granted by a second videocamera inside the office itself.  The tape, he realized, had probably been edited together from four or five separate tapes to show just those two angles--suspicious in and of itself.  he two viewpoints alternated, and he watched as a woman appeared at the end of the hall, hurrying to the office door before whoever was monitoring the cameras saw her and set off the alarm.  Mulder paused the tape and studied the slim, black-clad figure, making some initial notes.  She appeared to be extremely petite, even shorter than Scully--barely five feet tall, if that.  Her weight was proportionate, making her perhaps ninety pounds.  Neither her facial features nor hair color could be seen because of the black ski-mask she wore, but the eyeholes did give him a glimpse of her eyes, which were a very bright green.  He scrawled the words _Caucasian_  and _contact lenses?_  on his notepad, added his estimates of the woman's height and weight, then frowned.  There was something unusual about her eyes beyond their almost artificially-bright color--but the low-grade resolution of the video made it impossible to get a clear look.  He scowled.  *It's going to take experts to clean up the low-end interference on the tape and digitize the image to get a better look.*  He was suddenly glad that Scully *had* taken time off; if she were here, he would feel obliged to ask her to accompany him, and he had little doubt that Frohike's comments would do nothing but annoy her again. 

                With a minute shake of his head, he unpaused the tape and let it roll forward again.  The woman on the screen glanced around as a flashing light mounted on the ceiling indicated that the alarm had gone off, revealing her presence.

                Then she stepped forward and walked _through_ the wall.

                "Unbelievable!" Mulder blurted, and swiftly rewound the tape.  Again, before his eyes, she slipped through the solid wall like a ghost.  He let the tape play on, and in a second, the camera view changed again to show him the interior of the office.  The woman had gone straight over to the office safe, a huge wall vault large enough to use as a bedroom.  As he watched, she rushed forward and slipped into it, through the three-inch thick steel door, then came back out holding a plain cloth bag of the type that money was kept in at banks.  _Probably dark inside the vault_ , he speculated.  She opened the bag and checked inside; Mulder saw the flash of twenty- and fifty-dollar bills and then the girl pulled the drawstring tight on the bag before walking back into the safe through the door.  She did not come back out.  Bare seconds later, MPs burst into the office, guns drawn--but the thief was gone.

                The tape ended and Mulder rewound it to watch it again, fascinated.  The girl's clothes were plain--a black sweater and jeans and running shoes--and offered no clue to who she was or why she had robbed the Base office.  She wore gloves, he noted, though since she could apparently move through any surface, she hardly had to worry about leaving fingerprints.

                When he had finished watching the tape a second time, he shut the TV off and reached for the telephone, dialling the number of the Lone Gunmen from memory.  _And_ , he told himself, _when I'm done with them--unless they can prove the tape is an elaborate hoax--I'd better make a reservation for the next flight to San Diego._

 

* * *

**San Diego**

 

                Nicole Alexander stared at the withered, frail form laying in the hospital bed.  _It isn't fair,_ she thought despairingly.  The fifty-one-year-old man looked ninety, and she knew he wouldn't live to see his next birthday.  Tears welled up in the corners of her eyes and she wiped them away angrily, reaching into the heavy canvas tote bag that hung over her shoulder for a tissue and stopping herself just in time.  _Dammit, Dad, why'd you let them do this to you?!?_   She whirled and strode out of the room swiftly, afraid if she stayed even another moment longer, she'd break down.

                The bag she carried seemed to weigh a ton as she stalked out of the hospital's cancer ward and took the elevator down to the administration wing of the building.  Her feet knew the way to the office she sought by heart now, having taken that path many, many times in the past.  _But I'll never have to do it again,_ she thought distantly.  _What I did the other night was wrong--but in a way, it was right, too--and there was, after all, no other choice._

                She noted the line of people that led to the billing counter, but passed it by; her father's treatment costs were well over the petty sums that made those wretches stand guiltily shuffling their feet.  The hospital's assistant administrator had threatened to cut off her father's chemotherapy if the overdue account was not attended to, and soon.  *The bastard!* Nicole fumed.  She turned down the hall that led to his office and shoved the door open with a slender arm.

                The prim-looking receptionist looked up from the letter she was typing with one lifted eyebrow.  "Good morning," she trilled sweetly.  "Can I help you?"

                "Please inform Mr. Dunsany that Nicole Alexander is here regarding the payment of her father's treatment costs," Nicole said stiffly.  The receptionist's other eyebrow went up in surprise and Nicole had to stifle a giggle at the woman's startled look.  _It's good to know I can still laugh,_ she thought as the woman relayed her name over the intercom, _although it's been damn hard to find things worth laughing about lately._

                "Go right in," the receptionist said after a moment.  "Mr. Dunsany is waiting."

                Nicole stared at the door with dread gluing her feet to the floor, but finally marched across the room and into the office beyond.

                Mr. Dunsany looked up from the papers he was going over behind his immense, slick-looking desk of teak and green marble.  Nicole just barely managed to hide the disgust she felt as the stocky, balding man leered at her with unconcealed lust in his eyes.  "Ms. Alexander," he purred smugly, pursing his sluglike pink lips into a self-satisfied smile.  "Nice to see you so soon after our last little discussion.  Have you come to begin payments on your father's bill?"  She could sense the rapacity in his crawling gaze and knew he was just waiting to see her break down and cry.

                She merely stared at him, not bothering to hide the contempt she felt.  "No, I haven't," she said quietly, pulling the tote bag off her shoulder as his grin widened.  "I've come to pay it in full."  As the smirk on his face faltered, she pulled a single slip of paper out of the bag, a cashier's check for the full amount of the bill.  As emotionally satisfying as it would have been to simply dump the cash from the Navy vault all over his desk, she had known such an act wouldn't be wise.  _Randy might not know fidelity if it bit him_ , she thought with detachment, _but when I told him about Dad's illness, he was only too happy to help however he could._   She suppressed a wistful smile at the memory of the look on her ex's face when she had pulled the cash out of her bag and handed it over to him.  They had broken up amicably enough over six months ago but still kept in touch.  _Because--let's face it--it's handy to know someone whose parents are richer than God._   He had taken the cash and promised to deposit it into his own account over a period of several months, so not to draw the attention of the government, then provided her with the check in return.  She let the grin surface as Dunsany gaped.

                _He thought I wouldn't be able to pay it; he thought he'd get to see me beg for him not to turn my father out into the streets._   Dunsany picked up the check and looked at her in stunned incomprehension.  "But...how did you...where--" he stammered.

                "I borrowed it from a friend," she told him coldly, the words not a complete lie, not really caring, at that moment, whether he believed her or not.  "And my friend will loan me as much money as it takes to keep my father's hospital costs paid, so I don't want to hear another word about terminating his stay."  She fixed him with an icy glare.  "One more thing.  I'll be staying with my father during visiting hours from now on.  He needs a familiar face around him instead of all these strangers, and I've got plenty of free time now that I've had to quit classes because of your bullshit."  She was angry, angrier than she could ever remember having been in her life, and Dunsany knew it.  He frowned at her outburst, but--as she had known he would--prudently held his tongue.

* * *

**March 11; San Diego**

 

                "--so you have no idea who this woman is?" Mulder asked, armed with an enlarged and computer-enhanced print of the thief, copied from the security tape.  The picture had been cropped to frame the woman's black-masked face, especially the eyes.

                Byers, Langly, and Frohike had done an exceptional job of clarifying the images on the tape, and Mulder was still amazed by what the photograph showed.

                Brilliant green irises framed ebony pupils that--so far as he knew--had no parallel in any other creature on Earth.  _Wish Scully was here_ , he thought darkly.  _She might have more information on this than I do.  Could that have been caused by a disease or some sort of birth defect?_   Instead of round, normal, human pupils--or even the vertically slit pupils of a cat or snake--the thief's pupils were _diamond-shaped_.  Like a square turned on its side, the eyes stared out from the ski mask, an anomaly unlike any he had ever seen before.

                "That's what I said, Agent Mulder," Lieutenant Terrell said sourly.  "I've never seen her before.  She's certainly not base personnel."  The comptroller flipped the photo back to Mulder dismissively.  "And I'll be happy if I never have to see her again.  Now, if you don't mind, I've got a group from Naval Intelligence due in ten minutes, and I have to get my shit together.  If I'm lucky, I won't end up in a stockade for this."

                "Do you mind if I talk with the Marines who were guarding the building the night of the robbery?" Mulder asked mildly.  Terrell rolled his eyes.

                "Sure, whatever you want," he snorted.  "But they're in custody pending debriefing and possible arrest.  They're being kept in isolation until NIS can talk with them.  Seen the tape?" he questioned.  Mulder nodded and Terrell laughed.  "Right now, the spooks are all over talking to the FX boys at Industrial Light and Magic.  I mean, it's got to be some sort of illusion, a hoax--right?"

                "Could be," Mulder admitted neutrally.  Terrell pulled a pack of cigarettes out of his pocket, then glanced up at the NO SMOKING signs bolted to the walls of the office in compliance with the military's recent policy changes.  With a scowl, he jammed the pack back into his pocket and looked up at Mulder with level eyes.

                "Frankly, I hope those damn jerks who were on guard end up in Leavenworth.  I think they left their posts--hell, had to've.  I mean, no one could've gotten past them if they'd been doing their jobs."

                Privately, Mulder doubted that very much, but he thanked Terrell and left.

* * *

 

                Five of the six guards who'd been on duty in the Administration building were of no help to Mulder, but the sixth gave him a place to start.

                "Those eyes..." the man--a lean, sharp Marine named Chapman--muttered thoughtfully.  "Something..."  Mulder waited patiently, some sixth sense within telling him to stay silent.  At last, the man looked up, face lighting up as he remembered.  "Shit, yeah.  I was in the VA hospital here in town a little more than a year ago; I was painting the barracks and fell off a ladder, breaking my hip.  While I was waiting in the emergency room, a girl came in and started arguing with the nurse at the front desk about..."  He trailed off, brow furrowed as he strained to remember.  "Her dad, if I remember right.  She wanted to know why they wouldn't take care of his treatment."

                "Do you know what he was in for?" Mulder asked him.

                Chapman shrugged.  "Nahh.  I got the impression it was somethin' pretty bad, though.  The lady at the desk said the girl had to discuss it with Dr. Romaine.  Sounded like a bunch of crap to me.  If her dad was a vet, he had as much of a right to be there as I did.  Anyway, the girl looked pretty upset; she was wearing dark glasses and she put one hand through her hair--you know how women do when they're pissed--"  Chapman demonstrated, raking one callused hand through the half-inch stubble on his pate, "--and knocked the glasses off.  That's when I saw her eyes.  The lady at the front desk stared, and the girl stormed off."

                "Do you remember anything else about the girl?" Mulder asked, intrigued.  "How old she appeared, what she looked like?  What was the color of her hair?  How was she dressed?"

                "She was blonde, young--college student, I think.  Long hair--down to her back.  Wore jeans and a t-shirt and had one'a those bags the college kids take with 'em everywhere," Chapman told him.  Mulder scribbled the description down and nodded.

                "And this was more than a year ago?" he asked.

                "New Year's Day, last year," Chapman replied promptly.  "I remember it 'cause I was hungover from the New Year's Eve party I went to when I fell off the ladder."  He grinned and shrugged.

                Mulder rose and shook the man's hand.  "Thank you for your time, PFC Chapman.  You've been very helpful."  The guard by the door let him out and Mulder headed for his car.  The VA hospital was only a fifteen-minute drive away.

 

* * *

**Washington, D.C.**

                "It's that time again," LaSalle sneered, his voice thick with anticipation.  Stone grimaced, glad that his only contact with the man was over the phone and not face-to-face.

                "You'll get your money," he growled flatly, struggling to keep the rage he felt from entering his voice, glancing around to make sure that no one was listening.  The advantage of a pay phone over the ones at home or the office was that he was fairly certain they weren't tapped; on the down side, there was always a chance that anyone wandering past could hear him no matter how low he kept his voice.  "But this is the last payment I'm going to make."

                "You might want to rethink that idea, Arnie," LaSalle laughed.  "So long as I've got those pictures of you pulling the trigger on that 'missing' mob informant, you're going to keep passing me the green.  Should've thought twice before agreeing to take care of that witness for your friend Don Paolo.  You know where to leave the envelope.  If it's not there in an hour, tomorrow those pictures will be on your boss' desk."  There was a click as LaSalle hung up.

                Stone slammed down the receiver, fighting down the fury that turned his heart to a blazing furnace inside his chest.  _If there was any way I could get my hands on that bastard--!_ He forced himself to calm down, and a nasty smile crept over his face as he thought of the case that Mulder had gone to investigate.  He had watched the videotape before turning it over to Mulder, and though he--like most of the other agents at the Bureau --ridiculed the agent's beliefs, he was canny enough to accept the evidence of his eyes even when there was no rational scientific explanation for it.  _The girl walked through walls_ , he mused, a possessive glint in his eyes.  _If Mulder finds her, she might be just the thing I need to take care of LaSalle once and for all.  After all, I might not be able to get close to him, but a woman who can walk through walls--?_

                His grin widened coldly as he turned away from the pay phone to go drop off the envelope that contained the most recent installment for his blackmailer.  _I think I'll call Mulder out in California and see how he's doing_ , he thought, stepping out into the cold air and heading for his car.  _With Agent Scully out for the week, he could probably use some help on this case.  Knowing him, it's only a matter of time before he finds the girl; no matter how much of a freak he might be, he's good.  A dangerous criminal like that thief might 'accidentally' kill him--and then I'll be there to sweep in and pick up the pieces._

                He laughed, unlocking the door of his car, and slid behind the wheel with a grin.

* * *

 

                "Mr. Alexander is located in room 716 on the seventh floor, in the Oncology ward," the dark-haired nurse told Mulder.  He smiled in thanks and turned away, walking down the hall toward the elevator.

                The hour he had spent at the Administration office at the VA hospital had been more fruitful than he'd dared hope, though it had been like pulling teeth to get information from the Hospital's administrator.  A search of the VA's records had located four cancer patients at the hospital on January 1, 1993--and of those four, only one had been turned away for advanced treatment.  The man's name was Stephen Alexander, and he had served from 1964 to 1982--first on the cruiser Long Beach, then on other ships until his retirement.  In 1995, the retired seaman had developed a rare and virulent form of lymphatic cancer that had spread swiftly to his skeletal system.  He had originally applied for treatment at the VA hospital and turned away for reasons the hospital administrator wouldn't divulge; currently, he was registered as receiving inpatient treatment at the Sisters of Blessed Mercy hospital halfway across the city from the base, near the University of California at San Diego.  Records showed that Alexander's wife had died in 1983 in a fire, but Mulder had learned that there was a daughter, born in 1973, who had been a student at the University until just recently.  His first stop had been the college; a search through the yearbooks had netted several pictures of the girl.  Nicole Alexander was 21, platinum blonde, with dark glasses hiding her eyes in every photo.  There had been a few candid shots of the girl scattered through the books, and he had been pleased to see that her build matched the build of the woman on the surveillance camera tape.

                He reached out to press the elevator button, a thoughtful look on his face as he contemplated his next move.  _Even if I find the girl, I have no real proof that she's the thief,_ he pondered.  _Chapman's story isn't enough for an arrest; by his own admission, he was hungover and in pain when he saw the girl.  Even if her eyes match the eyes of the girl on the video, it's going to be difficult to get an arrest warrant._

                A young woman in faded jeans and a black sweater came hurrying out of a corridor intersecting with the main hall, and she bumped into him as she skidded to a halt in front of the elevator.  "Sorry," she apologized distantly, running a hand through moonlight-colored hair.  The motion dislodged the dark glasses she wore, revealing eyes as green as spring's first leaves with bizarre, diamond-shaped pupils.  She jerked the glasses back into place with one hand as the elevator door opened.

                Mulder stood stunned for less than a second--then reached out and grabbed the girl by one slim wrist.  "Hey!" she yelped, trying to pull away from him as nurses, orderlies, and a doctor filed past them through the open elevator door.  The staffers frowned, concerned, and Mulder reached for his ID.

                "Ms. Alexander, I'm Agent Fox Mulder of the F.B.I.," he stated firmly.  "I'd like you to come with me; I have some questions for you regarding the robbery at the Comptroller's office on the 32nd Street Naval Base last Tuesday night."

                The girl froze, eyes wide and terrified, the heavy canvas bag slung over her shoulder slipping down her arm and landing on the floor at her feet.  Then she shook her head mindlessly and pulled away.

                Mulder knew that he had not relaxed his grip, but suddenly the girl was free and dashing back down the corridor toward the emergency entrance.  He snatched the girl's bag up off the floor and ran after her, realizing that she had slipped away from him in the same way she had gone through the walls at the Comptroller's office.  _Like a ghost,_ he thought as the girl darted through the automatic emergency doors.  "Ms. Alexander, halt!" he yelled after her, rushing to squeeze through the doors as they began to close.

                Nicole Alexander was gone.

                With a curse, Mulder slid his ID back into his pocket and stalked angrily toward his rented car.


	2. Chapter 2

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Mulder finds his X-File. She has a sad story to tell.

                Mulder knocked on the door firmly, but there was no answer.  "Ms. Alexander?  Open up, F.B.I.!" he called into the early evening silence.  He had stopped at the Naval Base's administration office again and requisitioned Stephen Alexander's file.  They had--grudgingly--provided it for him, and the address in the retired seaman's file matched the more current one in the phone book.

                When there was still no reply, he scowled and glanced around furtively.  There was no one else in sight, no cars coming up the street, and he put his shoulder to the door and bashed it open, wishing like never before that Scully was with him.  Though nothing had indicated that the Alexander girl was dangerous--in fact, she had seemed outright scared to him--she _had_ robbed a United States naval base, and he would have liked to have back-up with him

                He went inside with his gun drawn, expecting to be jumped at any moment.  But the house was quiet, the room only dimly-lit by the fading sunlight coming in through the windows.  Feeling sheepish, Mulder lowered his gun and flicked on the living room light.

                The room was shabby but comfortable, and had a lived-in feel to it.  There was a couch and two faded green easy chairs opposite the TV, which was at least eight years old.  Behind the chairs, on the mantel of the fireplace--which had long ago been bricked up--was a silver-framed photograph of the man he had seen in the Personnel Office's file--a picture obviously taken in earlier and happier times.  A young-looking Stephen Alexander stood half-embracing an even younger woman, who could not have been more than twenty years old.  Both of them wore Naval uniforms, and Mulder guessed that the woman in the photograph was Alexander's late wife Michelle.

                "She's dead and he's dying," came a voice from behind him.  Mulder spun, dropping the picture, the hand that held his sidearm coming up.  The girl stood framed in the open doorway, poised to flee, looking as skittish as an abused horse; he had not heard her come in behind him.  She glanced at the picture he had dropped and spoke again.  "He's dying, and all the money in the world won't prevent that.  But the hospital was going to dump him in the street like an empty coffee cup if they didn't get their money."  She clenched her fists in anger.  "He'd be dead in minutes if they took him off life-support and the drugs.  At least this way, he'll have--I'll have--a few more days.  I never got the chance to say goodbye to my mother.  And it's only right that the Navy should pay for his hospital costs.  They should have done so from the start.  After all, they're the ones who made him sick."

                Mulder stared at the girl, then slowly lowered his weapon.  "What do you mean?" he asked, though he had the beginnings of an idea after his talk with Chapman.

                She didn't answer right away, and he could see the last dying light of day glinting off the white-blonde hair, tears shining in the depths of her eyes over the dark lenses of the sunglasses she wore.  "In 1969, before I was born, my father was assigned to the CGN Truxtrun, a nuclear-powered cruiser that saw duty in the Pacific as part of the escort group to the carrier Enterprise.  That was during the Vietnam war."  She paused.  "There was an accident with one of the reactors--just a little one.  It was hushed up, of course.  The Navy has the cleanest record with nuclear materials in the world, you know."  Her smile was as bitter and as cold as December frost.  "No one died, but my father and three other men were exposed to varying degrees of radiation during the cleanup--not enough to kill them outright, of course.  When my father got sick, I requested the records of those three other men.  My request was denied, even when I applied via the Freedom of Information Act.  So I asked a friend to hack into the computers at the Military Personnel Records Center in St. Louis.  The other men are all dead--one from a helicopter crash during the evacuation of Saigon, one in a car accident in 1979, and one, like my father, from runaway lymphatic cancer.  But the other two had also been in and out of the hospital for the three years before their deaths; Seaman First Class Berg, who died in Vietnam, had to have a cancerous lung removed; he was being evacuated from the hospital when the helicopter he was in crashed and died."  Her smile twisted.  "He would have been retired on disability if he had lived; the lung cancer saw to that.  Interestingly enough, he never smoked a day in his life."  She shrugged.  "Chief Petty Officer Koerner, who died in a car accident in Seattle in 1979, was undergoing outpatient chemotherapy for leukemia.  The conclusion drawn by the coroner who performed the autopsy was that the drugs he was taking for his cancer caused him to black out while driving, though it was the crash that actually killed him.  I made a trip up to Seattle several months ago and broke into the Medical Examiner's office to check the records."  She shook her head.  "All four men who helped clean up that spill later contracted cancer of one type or another.  That's proof enough for me that the accident on the Truxtrun was what eventually caused my father's illness, but it wasn't enough for the Navy, I guess.  My father received an honorable discharge in 1981; he first became sick eleven years later.  He should have been able to receive treatment at the city's VA hospital for his illness, but they snarled him up in paperwork for months and then finally turned him away without a reason.  Since then, he's just gotten sicker and sicker.  He's spent the last two years in and out of the hospital, and hasn't even been able to walk for the last ten months.  He might as well be dead already, but so long as I can, I'll make sure that he received treatment, no matter what I have to do to pay for it."  Her eyes shone with adamant determination, and impulsively, he holstered his Smith and Wesson.

                "Why did you come back here, if you knew I was searching for you?" he asked curiously.

                She shrugged, studying him.  "I'm not sure.  Maybe because I wanted to be able to talk to someone about it all--including what I can do.  No one else knows, not even my father.  When you grabbed me at the hospital, I almost didn't run.  I felt I could tell you everything and you would understand.  I felt I could...trust you."  She sighed, the sound weary and beaten.  "I've been holding it inside for a long time, but--" she paused, flushing, "--you have the kindest eyes I've ever seen."

                Mulder smiled wryly at the compliment and sighed.  "Look, if you promise not to run away again, I promise not to arrest you until you're done talking.  I am interested in what you can do; it's my job to investigate any strange cases that the Bureau gets, and this one qualifies."

                Nicole eyed him appraisingly.  "I won't run away, but you're _not_ going to arrest me."

                "You _did_ rob the Naval base, didn't you?" Mulder pointed out.

                "They deserved it!" she snapped sharply--then let out a deep breath and nodded.  "Even if you tried to arrest me, you couldn't.  I can go thin--"

                "Is that what you call what you do?" Mulder asked, and she nodded again.

                "I could go thin and you wouldn't be able to grab me, or keep handcuffs on me.  No jail in the country could hold me; I haven't yet found a substance I can't go through while thin.  You couldn't even shoot me--"

                "I wouldn't," Mulder corrected quietly.

                "--because while I'm thin, a bullet would just pass through my body without doing any harm.  But--" she gestured toward the kitchen, "--let's sit down and talk, and we'll pretend for a while that we're friends."  She smiled, and Mulder blinked when he saw how the smile erased the fear and stress from her face.  She was _beautiful_.  "I'd like to be your friend, Agent Mulder."

                He digested her comment in silence and they paced into the kitchen in silence.  She opened the refrigerator and took out two cans of soda, handing one to him, then sank into a chair at the table.  "I've been able to go thin since I was twelve--at right about the time when I hit puberty."  She smiled.  "I took biology--genetics--as my major in college, hoping I could figure out why I can do what I can do.  I think it's a benign mutation that came about from the changes the radiation induced in my father's DNA during the accident on the Truxtrun.  Like my eyes."  She slipped the sunglasses all the way off and stared directly at him, the pupils contracted to narrow slits at the center of the irises.  "Junior year, when I thought I understood that, I switched my major to physics to figure out the _how_ of it.  I haven't got it all figured out--that's a lot harder to decipher--but I think it has something to do with a subconscious relaxation of the energies that bind the atoms of my body together.  The atoms slip apart a bit and can pass between the atoms of other objects.  All solid matter, no matter how dense or porous, is mostly empty space--even steel or stone."  She opened her pop and took a sip.  "I can make my whole body thin, or just a specific part, like my arm or hand.  And the longest I've been able to stay thin is for almost three minutes."

                "Where did you go when you left the hospital?" Mulder asked.

                She grinned.  "I hid inside one of the big palm trees that border the sidewalk," she told him.  "I can't do it for very long--I have to breathe some time, and can't while I'm thin because immaterial lungs can't draw in air--but you didn't look around for more than a minute before leaving."

                Mulder nodded, storing her words for later consideration.  He reveled in being able to simply sit and talk to the object of one of his investigations, rather than ferreting out government cover-ups or trying not to get shot.  _Though_ , he mused, _if Scully were here, she would be criticizing me for not having arrested Ms. Alexander the moment I found her.  The girl DID commit a crime._

                "When you took the money out of the vault at the Comptroller's office, you went back into the safe.  How did you leave?"

                "Oh, I just went through the outside wall.  The alarms had gone off, you know, and I didn't want any of the guards accidentally shooting each other trying to get me."  She smiled softly.

                His pocket-pager beeped at him and he started, pulling it out of his pocket.  "I need to find a phone," he murmured.

                "Use mine," she said with the overconfidence of the young.  "I'm not worried about anyone else finding me."

                "What, you've never heard of a call being traced?" he asked dryly as he picked the receiver off its cradle on the kitchen counter.  He dialed the number that scrolled across the pager's screen, a number he recognized as a Bureau extension.  The phone was answered on the first ring and Mulder heard an odd double click in the breath of silence before whoever was on the other end spoke.

                "Agent Stone," the man answered.  Mulder scowled, knowing from the click that the call was, indeed, being traced.

                "Stone?  This is Mulder.  What do you want?"

                "Hey, Spooky, just calling to see how you're doing," Stone replied exuberantly.

                "I've made some progress," Mulder told him warily.  "But nothing concrete so far."

                "Too bad," Stone sighed.  "Well, maybe you'll get a little further with some help.  With Agent Scully out of the office, I've been assigned to fly out and aid you.  I'll be there in the morning."

                "Why you?"  The question slipped from Mulder's lips before he could stop himself, and he frowned, but Stone seemed not to notice the rudeness.

                "'Cause the case landed on my desk in the first place," he answered.  "I'll be arriving at Lindbergh Field around ten tomorrow.  See you then, buddy."  And the line went dead.

                Mulder bit back an oath and hung up the phone.  _So much for luck_ , he thought irritably.  _Guess it couldn't last forever._   He turned and saw Nicole regarding him with an unreadable gaze.

                "Trouble?" she asked finally, looking edgy.

                "Another agent is being sent out tomorrow with the investigation," Mulder answered.  "I don't particularly like the man, but I don't have much choice about working with him."

                Nicole nodded.  "Then why didn't you just tell him you'd found the thief?  It's the truth, isn't it?"  She looked nervous again, had risen from her chair, and Mulder frowned in surprise when he realized that he was actually wishing he could do something to take the hunted expression from her face.

                "This case isn't just about finding a thief," Mulder said with a sigh.  "The cases that I work on are designated X Files, and they're about learning more about the unknown, solving mysteries that don't seem to have rational answers.  If you'd been the usual sort of thief and I'd tracked you down, you'd no doubt be in jail right now, pending arraignment.  But the waters here are muddy.  If there was an accident and a cover-up, then the Navy had a duty to take care of your father's medical costs, which might be counted as mitigating circumstances where the robbery was concerned."  _And_ , he thought darkly, _if you were taken into custody and it was proved beyond any doubt that you can do what it appears you can do, you'd vanish--either to end up in an unmarked grave as 'too dangerous' or 'recruited' by an agency such as the C.I.A. or the N.S.A._ He knew how the government's various intelligence agencies worked, and a person who could do what Nicole Anderson could apparently do would be viewed wither as a terrible threat or an unbelievably valuable asset.

                "Ms. Alexander--" he began, but she waved one hand at him negligently.

                "Call me Nicole," she said.  "After all I've told you, you might as well call me by my first name.  I think we're past false formality by now."  Mulder sighed, not wanting to step outside of the bounds of his role as agent, hers as suspect, but she made it hard to stay within those bounds.  _I don't want to like her if I'm going to have to arrest her,_ he admitted to himself, _but she's making it hard to stay impersonal_.  She favored him with a sweet smile and he allowed himself to relax just a bit.

                "Nicole," he began again with a wry grin, "do you think you could demonstrate 'going thin' for me?"

                She grinned.  "Oh, I could do better than that, if you like," she said.  "Would you like to go with me?"

                Mulder sat up abruptly, his eyes wide.  "Can you DO that?"

                "I experimented a lot to learn my limits when I first found out what I could do," she answered.  "I can take a certain amount of excess mass with me when I'm thin--otherwise I could only go thin while I was stark naked, and I couldn't have taken that money with me."  She chuckled.  "How much do you weigh?"

                "About one hundred and seventy pounds," he replied honestly.  "Too much?"

                "No, I can take up to two hundred pounds."  She cocked her head, a thoughtful look on her face.  "You should probably take off your shoes and jacket, just in case...and maybe your gun."  She wrinkled her nose in distaste.  "I've never thinned a gun before, or anything involving a chemical reaction.  I won't even carry matches along for that reason, and I don't know whether or not the process might make your ammunition discharge--or worse.  Now, as for what you should expect--well, have you ever seen the movie Ghost?"  Mulder nodded, shedding his shoes and blazer and--reluctantly--his sidearm.  He laid them on the table and turned to her.  "Well, that's about what it looks like when you pass through a solid object.  I couldn't possibly describe what it _feels_ like."

                "How do you do it?  Does it require concentration?" Mulder asked.

                "Not really," Nicole replied.  "I really only have to will it.  It doesn't take more of an effort than seeing does--to see, you just look.  Speaking of which, if you get dizzy or nauseous when we step through the wall, just close your eyes and keep walking.  I'm only going to take us through one wall--a very short trip.  You'll want to take a deep breath--" she turned toward the wall that separated the kitchen from the living room with a smile, "--and you'll have to take my hand."

                It occurred to him that he would be totally vulnerable to her if he let her make him thin; all she had to do to kill him would be to let go of his hand.  _I can't do what she does; I'd solidify in the middle of a plaster-and-lathe wall, and that would kill me just as surely as if someone shot me in the heart._  But he stared into her eyes for a moment and then took the hand she offered.  _I didn't come out here--didn't take over the X Files in the first place--to play things safe._

                "Ready?" she asked.  He took a deep breath and nodded, and they stepped forward--into the wall. 

                Every part of his body tingled as though he had grabbed a low-voltage electrical line.  A miasma of white and brown particles suspended all around him like floating soup filled his field of vision--the atoms of the wood and plaster wall, he assumed.  Though he knew he was in a state of immateriality, he could still--somehow--feel Nicole's hand gripping his, as she guided him through the wall and out the other side.

                They came back out into the living room, free of the wall, and she released his hand.  Mulder staggered a step, shaking his head sharply to confirm that it had really happened, then took a tentative breath and turned.

                Nicole was holding his blazer and sidearm out for him.  He stared at her uncertainly and then took the gun, sliding it back into its holster, and pulled the suit-coat on over his arms.  "What did you think?" she asked.  "Was it what you expected?"

                "Frankly, I wasn't sure _what_ to expect," Mulder said.  "But it was different."  He sighed as he went back into the kitchen and sat down at the table to put his shoes back on.  "I need to return to my hotel.  I'm going to make some inquiries about the accident on the Truxtrun and your father's medical benefits."

                "You won't get anywhere," Nicole said, her brow creasing in a frown.

                "Maybe, maybe not," Mulder agreed.  "But if I can find evidence that your father was wronged by a cover-up, the military might drop the charges against you in exchange for your silence.  I'd like your word that you won't go anywhere before I can talk with you tomorrow morning."

                "I'm not leaving while my father is still alive," Nicole promised, her eyes regretful.  "But you know as well as I do that even if the Navy drops the charges, there's no way I'll be allowed to live a normal life when they learn what I can do.  People like me are just tools to people like them, Agent Mulder."

                He met her eyes steadily, feeling angry and faintly ashamed.  "I know that," he said at last.  "I just didn't realize you knew it, too."

                She shrugged.  "When my father is dead, I'll vanish.  No one can hold me against my will--unless maybe they keep me sedated for the rest of my life, and then I wouldn't be of much use to them.  There's lots of places where a person can just vanish.  Canada, maybe."  She smiled awkwardly.  "Lots of places."  He stood and she took the two cans of pop over to the sink, letting the dregs drain before turning back to him.  "I don't know how much you'll be able to help, but thanks for letting me talk."

                He nodded and she walked with him quietly to the front door.  "I'll come by in the morning and let you know if I've learned anything," he assured her.

                She nodded.  "Thank you for trying."  He marched down the sidewalk to where his car was parked and turned around to look before unlocking the door to get in.  She had gone back inside, shutting the front door behind her.


	3. Chapter 3

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> It'll end in tears.

                Nicole watched Mulder drive away, then let the curtain fall back into place over the front window.  _He's a nice guy_ , she reflected, _one of the last of a dying breed._   She walked over to the fireplace and picked up the picture of her mother and father, setting it back up on the mantel.  _They look so happy,_ she thought wistfully, staring at the photograph.  _Frozen in time, back before any of this nightmare ever happened, before--_

                The phone in the kitchen rang and she flinched in surprise, tensing.  She hurried into the other room before it could ring again and plucked the receiver off its cradle.

                "Alexander residence; Nicole speaking," she answered anxiously, expecting to hear the voice of Dr. Marks on the other end, telling her that her father had passed on at last.  But the voice that filled her ear was that of a stranger.

                "Ms. Alexander?  This is Special Agent Arnold Stone, F.B.I.  Is Agent Mulder still there?"

                Nicole went rigid, realizing that Mulder had not been paranoid after all.  _If I say yes, he'll want to speak with Mulder-_ -  "No, he's gone," she confessed nervously.

                "Good," Stone purred.  "I checked in with the Bureau branch in San Diego and backtracked all of Mulder's stops, Ms. Alexander.  That--and tracing the call he made to me after I paged him--were how I was able to locate you.  You're the woman he's after, aren't you?  The one who robbed the Naval Base?"

                "I don't know what you're talking about," Nicole denied, frightened now.  Some sixth sense was telling her not to trust the man she spoke with-- _not_ , she thought anxiously, _that I needed to rely only on my own judgment.  Mulder said he doesn't like this man, and now I know why._

                "Yes, you do," Stone contradicted.  "It doesn't matter, Ms. Alexander.  You don't have to worry about this call being recorded; I shut off the tape deck before dialling.  I'm arriving in San Diego tomorrow.  I know about what you can do and I know about your poor sick father.  I have a little job I want you to do for me back in D.C.  If you don't--" she could hear the harsh edge of violence tainting his already-coarse voice, "--then I'm going to kill your father."

                The gasp that escaped her lips was choked.  "You stay away from him!!!" she cried, feeling tears prickle behind her eyelids.  "Isn't it enough that he's nearly dead already because of people like you!  _**GOD**_!"  The tears spilled down her cheeks, but she made no effort to contain them or wipe them away.

                "I'll talk with you tomorrow morning, Ms. Alexander," Stone reiterated.  "What I want isn't really any harder than the robbery you pulled.  Just one little task and then your old man can die in peace." 

                The connection was severed and the dial tone hummed in her ear, and Nicole slammed the receiver down with a sob.  _What can I do?_ she thought wildly, ready to crumple to the kitchen floor and break down.  _I can't call the hospital; they'd never believe me unless I show them what I can do!  And I don't know where Mulder is staying--but I can't let that animal hurt Dad!_

                It was a minute before she could get her feelings back under control, but she finally stood up, grabbing her car keys before heading for the front door.

 

* * *

**March 12**

 

                Mulder leaned back against the wall as the passengers of Flight 204 from D.C. came streaming in through Gate 12.  He kept his eyes peeled for Stone, but as the last passenger disembarked, he realized his unwanted new partner was not here.

                "Damn," he muttered under his breath, pulling out his cell-phone.  He punched in the number to the main office in Washington; the phone was answered on the first ring.

                "Assistant Director Skinner's office," the receptionist chirped.

                "This is Agent Mulder.  Let me talk to Skinner," he growled.

                He was connected instantly.  "What's the problem this time, Agent Mulder?" Skinner answered, his tone clipped and brusque as usual.

                "I'm still in San Diego.  Did Agent Stone decide to take a later flight out?"

                "Out where, Agent Mulder?" Skinner responded.  "Agent Stone is on vacation.  He left yesterday and will be gone for two weeks."

                "What--?" Mulder sputtered, his hand tightening around the receiver as he realized that Stone was up to something--something dirty, no doubt.  "Never mind.  I'll call later with details."

                He hung up before Skinner could say more and quickly dialed the Anderson house, letting it ring a dozen times before hanging up again and racing out of the airport to the lot where he had parked his car.

* * *

 

                Nicole shifted in her chair at her father's bedside, holding his withered hand gently.  She smiled down at him, even though she knew he could no longer see her.  She had sat there all night, holding his hand, hiding in the shadows when the nurses had come in at their scheduled times to check on him.  Though she was weary, she was determined.  _I won't do whatever it is that Stone wants,_ she thought for the hundredth time.  _Even though I don't know what it is, it can't be anything good, or he wouldn't have to make threats to force me to do it.  But neither will I let him hurt Dad.  Dad doesn't have much time left, and I've gone without sleep for longer than this back in college when I was studying for finals.  Her smile deepened.  If Stone shows his face here, I'll thin **HIM** ; Stone can't shoot or strangle or smother Dad if he can't touch him._  She tried not to think about how long it would take to stop him, or what would happen if Stone weighed more than two hundred pounds.  _But no matter what it takes..._

                "Nicole?" came a puzzled voice from behind her.  Nicole turned without letting go of her father's hand and sighed in relief as she saw Mulder standing in the doorway.  "What are you doing here?"

                "That may who you called yesterday called me back after you left," Nicole informed him, barely able to believe that she had been forced into this position.  "He said he'd figured out that I was the person you'd been tracking, and he threatened to kill my father unless I did something for him.  'A little task', he called it, but he didn't say what.  I don't think whatever it is, is legal."

                Mulder's eyes went dark with anger.  "Damn him!" he swore.  "I went out to the airport to pick him up and he wasn't there.  When I called the Bureau, they told me that he had not only not been assigned to help me, but that he had started his vacation yesterday."

                Beside Nicole in the bed, Stephen Alexander's chest rose, fell, and did not rise again.  Nicole bent her head stiffly as she realized what had happened, and slowly let go of her father's hand.  "It...it doesn't matter... not any more," she choked.

                Mulder hesitated for only a second and then moved to her side to check the old man's pulse.  He nodded quietly and stepped back as two doctors and a nurse rushed into the room.  "Come on," Mulder said softly, taking Nicole's hand and pulling her to her feet.  "There's nothing more you can do for him now."

                She nodded and followed him out of the room, biting her lower lip in an attempt to keep the tears in her eyes from overflowing.  Mulder handed her the canvas tote bag she had dropped at the elevator the day before, and she took it without really seeing it.  "I guess I'd better get out of here," she said hoarsely as he led her downstairs to the hospital's basement level, where the parking garage was located.  "Stone will be after me--and so will everyone else."  She looked up at him, troubled.  "I did say that I wouldn't leave until after my father died.  I wish I could stay, but--"

                Her words were cut off the minute they stepped out of the stairwell as a dark-clad form grabbed her around the neck and dragged her away from Mulder.  Mulder drew his pistol, then snarled as he saw Stone holding the girl tightly, one arm locked around her neck, holding his sidearm to her temple with his other hand.

                "Back off, Mulder!" Stone ordered.  "And put your gun down or the girl's worm food!"

                "You won't shoot her," Mulder coaxed, knowing if he tried to shoot that he might hit Nicole-- _but I won't!_ he realized abruptly.  _A bullet will go through her without hurting her if she's thin!_

                "Yes, I will," Stone spat.  "She's going to kill someone for me, someone who's been a thorn in my side for too long!"

                "I won't kill anyone!" Nicole cried.  "Don't drop your gun, Agent Mulder!  He'll shoot you if you do!"

                "I'll shoot her if you don't, Mulder, I swear it!" Stone yelled.

                Mulder stared at Nicole and all of a sudden she shoved backward, knocking Stone's arm awry.  Stone's finger tightened automatically on the trigger, but the bullet passed through her harmlessly even as Mulder fired his own weapon.

                Stone stumbled backward and Nicole slipped from his grasp, thin, as Stone pawed at the spreading splotch of blood on the front of his chest.  His eyes were wide and stunned, and Mulder realized that Stone had not considered all the ramifications of Nicole's ability--that, since she could pass through solid objects, solid objects could pass through her.  Stone fell with a gurgle and Nicole stepped to Mulder's side, re-solidifying.

                "Is he dead?" she asked hollowly.  He nodded and her head jerked up as they heard sirens, coming closer.  "I have to get out of here before it's too late."

                "Nicole, wait--" Mulder said, but she shook her head and, before he could react, stepped up on tiptoes to plant a swift kiss on his lips.  He fell back, stunned, as she jerked away.

                "I wish I'd had more time to get to know you better," Nicole said as she raced toward the far wall.  "Maybe--maybe I'll see you again some time."

                And then, as the police and Naval Intelligence cars roared into the basement parking garage, she slipped through the wall and was gone.


End file.
